In response to the level of vote abuse we see on the servers I have restricted access to this feature to Seeders and Donors. Generally unwarranted votes won't pass but this will prevent just anyone from spamming votes when there is no admin on the server.

If you want to know how to become a Seeder you can read thisIf you want to know how to become a Donor you can read this

You can view all Stamm and Donor related perks here and here is a fully unlocked example

In all this vastness there is no hint that help will come from elsewhere to save us from ourselves

I will voice a dissenting opinion here, just so that our player base is aware that the admins know that this is not the best outcome, the admins as a whole believe this is what is best for our community as a whole. I would also like to make it clear that what I say in this comment is in no way speaking for the Skiver admins as a group and while it may reflect the opinion of multiple admins, it is purely my own opinion on the matter. /disclaimer

Man this sucks, less than 20 non-admin players (currently) will now be able to use the votemenu. This means if any of them or or an admin is not present things like micspam and hacking (not caught by smac) will be fair game. While I really hope this move motivates users to start Reporting here on the forums, and therefore being a more active part of the community, I do not think it will.

If I may voice my opinion. While it may not be the best idea, the vote system can be handed out to players with the highest stamm points. It is just my idea, I understand why the voting system has changed and I respect the decision to change it

Everybody out of my way. I got a hat full of bomb, a hand full of penis, and a head full of empty.

Battle Hardened Fox wrote:If I may voice my opinion. While it may not be the best idea, the vote system can be handed out to players with the highest stamm points. It is just my idea, I understand why the voting system has changed and I respect the decision to change it

We already considered this option. Unfortunatly it is not possible at this moment.

Battle Hardened Fox wrote:If I may voice my opinion. While it may not be the best idea, the vote system can be handed out to players with the highest stamm points. It is just my idea, I understand why the voting system has changed and I respect the decision to change it

We already considered this option. Unfortunatly it is not possible at this moment.

Understandable.

Will this voting system change again? I'm not asking for when, where, or how. Just will it?

Everybody out of my way. I got a hat full of bomb, a hand full of penis, and a head full of empty.

Can only go off of my experience so I'm assuming nothing changed significantly in the 2 weeks I haven't played on the server, but most of the times that someone abused the vote commands, almost every single time the rest of the server always votes "no" and reprimands the guy calling the votes for no reason.

And if there's an admin there then it gets resolved even easier.

I guess my feeling is, yes, there's vote abuse, but it never does any damage. And in the cases where it does people report the vote abuser on the forums.

Gangsta Luigi wrote:I feel like this is a step in the wrong direction.

Can only go off of my experience so I'm assuming nothing changed significantly in the 2 weeks I haven't played on the server, but most of the times that someone abused the vote commands, almost every single time the rest of the server always votes "no" and reprimands the guy calling the votes for no reason.

And if there's an admin there then it gets resolved even easier.

I guess my feeling is, yes, there's vote abuse, but it never does any damage. And in the cases where it does people report the vote abuser on the forums.

Looking back on my statement, it would be a good idea to remove the ban from the vote system. It's just my idea though, cause even if it's not a long ban, it causes the most damage

Everybody out of my way. I got a hat full of bomb, a hand full of penis, and a head full of empty.

The voting system is complicated and has issues regardless of the community or game it's on. Some wanted the system pulled entirely but I want to see what this does first, it may fail and everything gets reverted.

It's also not difficult to gain and maintain Seeder status for access to vote calling.

In all this vastness there is no hint that help will come from elsewhere to save us from ourselves

I have gotten a lot of requests for admin presence over the past month or so and it is reflected in the bans/silences, I account for about 50 percent of non console bans/silences in that timeframe. The vote system is rarely used correctly and it seems it is abused more often than not. I've seen people trying to ban for what should be a silence (if anything at all) and people trying to kick for something that should be a ban. People don't even check for an admin first. I'll be in spec trying to catch a hacker or someone using an inappropriate spray (and moving it constantly) and people jump right into !voteban mode which forces me to stop the vote and reveal to the hacker/sprayer that an admin is present which, of course., results in them turning off their aimbot before I can get a demo.

I've had people report someone abusing the !vote system and when I get there and watch what is going on, it turns out that there is a hacker who they are trying to votekick and people on the hacker's team are reporting it as !vote abuse because they are not falling victim to the hacker and don't know better. Or even better, I get my demo and ban someone and chat erupts with "Oh there is an admin on? Why was so and so kicked? He didn't do anything. Admin abuse!, admin is triggered" but that is another rant for another time.

As to mic spamming, people can mute them client side. Valve has even provided TWO DIFFERENT WAYS to do it and they both take fewer keystrokes/motions to perform than typing "!votemenu". But rather than simply solve the problem with a mute, they want to see people get punished or to tell them to "shut up" for 10 mins because it seems it is human nature to be an asshole or make things harder than they should be.

On top of all of this, the person being !vote silenced/kicked/banned can simply disconnect during the vote and then reconnect avoiding the punishment all together and most of them know this.

Yeah, I wish there were more admins and seeders to police things, but I sure as hell wont miss random idiots joining the servers and abusing the !vote system and having to be called from whatever I am doing to deal with it.

Maybe this solution isn't perfect, but what we had before sure wasn't either. Perhaps this will force more people to learn who is an admin, how to check for them online, and how to report problems.

I woke the same as any other day you knowI should have stayed in bed

The day I tried to liveI wallowed in the blood and mud withAll the other pigs